[Nasional-e] Conditions for a quick, clean war

[Ambon]

 Conditions for a quick, clean war
  Hugh White IHT  Friday, February 21, 2003

Four questions

CANBERRA There are four key questions about any war in Iraq. First, where
will Saddam Hussein deploy his troops? The more of Iraq he tries to defend,
the faster his army will be defeated.
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If he confronts the U.S. Army in open country on Iraq's borders, near its
oil fields or indeed anywhere where they can be found by American airpower,
they will be quickly destroyed. The lesson of the Gulf War in 1991 and every
conflict since is that no one can stand up to U.S. forces in the open.
Saddam has a tough choice: either face quick defeat or abandon almost all of
Iraq's territory, including its oil fields, at the outset, and concentrate
the bulk of his forces where they can resist most effectively. Which option
he chooses depends on his aims in a war that will lead to certain defeat. If
he wants only to offer an honorable resistance before accepting the
inevitable, perhaps hoping for a comfortable exile, then he will leave his
forces outside Baghdad to be taken apart from the air. If, as seems
probable, he wants to exact the maximum cost on invading forces, he will
pull most of his best units back into Baghdad.
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Second, how good is America's targeting intelligence? The United States will
hope to end the war quickly by striking Iraq's leadership and military
command early on. Whether that succeeds will depend entirely on whether they
can be found. The U.S. Air Force can destroy anything it can find. But
locating the correct targets can be surprisingly difficult.
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American intelligence is impressive but far from omniscient. The fruitless
search for Iraq's banned weapons shows how little is known about what goes
on in the country. Satellite imagery can only give hints about which
building houses a headquarters, and the Iraqis will be doing all they can to
conceal and mislead.
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In the process, Saddam will try to maximize the chances of civilian
casualties, as he did in 1991. There will very likely be tragic targeting
mistakes, and the chances of finding Saddam himself and his leadership early
in the war may be slim. Third, how well prepared are U.S. and other
coalition forces for urban warfare? If Saddam is not eliminated, and if
pulls his troops back into Baghdad to make a final stand, can America defeat
them there quickly without taking and inflicting a lot of casualties?
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One option would be to encircle Baghdad and wait Saddam out. But this would
not produce a quick victory, and it would risk a serious humanitarian crisis
for the city's civilian population. So if Saddam wants to fight in Baghdad,
the United States probably has little option but to oblige.
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Big heavy armies like America's are not designed for urban fighting, and the
technologies that find and destroy hostile forces on an open battlefield are
of much less use in a crowded city. The risk is that urban warfare regresses
into one-on-one shooting matches, where local knowledge counts for more than
technology and casualties mount fast.
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The Pentagon realized this weakness some years ago. For most of the last
decade it has put a big effort into developing urban warfare techniques. The
American military has studied the lessons of Blackhawk Down in Somalia, and
of Russia's urban fighting in Chechnya. It has probably learned, too, from
Israel's experience of operating against Palestinians in the urban areas of
the occupied territories.
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The result is a lot of new tactics and technology, like armed remotely
controlled robots and portable weapons that can destroy bunkers. Since the
possibility of war with Iraq came to the top of the U.S. agenda early last
year, such technologies and tactics have been spread widely around the U.S.
military.
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But most of the new technology is still untested in combat, and urban
fighting remains the toughest test that an army can face. U.S. forces will
be better prepared and equipped for urban warfare than any army before them,
but the fighting will still be tough if the Iraqis make a stand.
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But will the Iraqis fight? This is the fourth big question. Most Iraqi
soldiers probably have mixed feelings. They have no love for their leader,
and may be glad to see him go. On the other hand they probably have no love
for America, either, and would be reluctant to see their country fall under
Washington's control.
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Saddam must have doubts about their loyalty himself. He may be reluctant to
bring some of his divisions to Baghdad for fear that they will turn on him.
Most Iraqis probably do not yet know whether they will fight. It will depend
on the mood of the moment when the time comes. Most of Saddam's army will
melt away if the going gets tough, but enough will remain to exact a high
price if it comes to a street-by-street fight in Baghdad.
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If the answer to any one of these four key questions clearly falls America's
way, there will be a quick, clean victory. If Saddam tries to meet U.S.
forces in open country, or if the American targeting intelligence is good
enough to find him and his top commanders, or if new urban warfare doctrines
give the coalition forces a decisive edge, or if Iraq's soldiers don't
fight, then the war will be short.
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If all four questions go the other way, U.S.-led forces are in for a tough
time. If Saddam pulls back to Baghdad, and if he survives the bombing
campaign, and if the street-fighting is as hard as it has always been
before, and if the Iraqis fight bravely, the war will be protracted and
casualties will be high.
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The writer, a former senior Australian defense official, directs the
Australian Strategic Policy Institute in Canberra. These are his personal
views.